The Dragon carrying NASA’s Nick Hague and the Russian Space Agency’s Alexander Gorbunov will remain at the space station until February, turning what should have been a weeklong trip for Sunita Williams and Butch Wilmore into a mission lasting more than eight months. 

Two NASA astronauts were pulled from the mission to make room for Wilmore and Williams on the return leg. 

NASA likes to replace its station crews every six months or so. SpaceX has provided the taxi service since the company’s first astronaut flight in 2020. NASA also hired Boeing for ferry flights after the space shuttles were retired, but flawed software and other Starliner issues led to years of delays and more than USD 1 billion in repairs. 

Starliner inspections are underway at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center, with post-flight reviews of data set to begin this week. 

“We’re a long way from saying, ‘Hey, we’re writing off Boeing’,” NASA’s associate administrator Jim Free said at a pre-launch briefing. 

With the arrival of two new astronauts, the four crew members who have been aboard the space station since March are set to return to Earth in just over a week aboard their SpaceX capsule. Their return was delayed by a month due to complications with the Boeing Starliner capsule.

(With inputs from AP)




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